Media streaming is becoming an increasingly popular way of delivering television, movies and other media content to viewers. Media streams are typically point-to-point or broadcast transmissions of digitized content that can be sent over the Internet or a similar network. Media streaming is often used to facilitate video on demand (VOD) services, local storage and/or remote storage digital video recorder (LSDVR and/or RSDVR) services, Internet Protocol television (IPTV) services, placeshifted media viewing and/or any number of other convenient services. In many cases, the media stream is played back for the viewer in real time as the stream continues to be delivered to the player. In other embodiments, the video is sideloaded or cached at the player to permit faster than real time delivery of the video stream.
In certain instances, a viewer may be interested in a certain program or program type or genre (e.g., a sports game, such as a football game). The viewer may not, however, be interested in watching each program of interest in its entirety, nor, in many instances, may the viewer be in a position to view a program or programs of interest. Due to the volume of sports games or other content of interest, many viewers may prefer to view the highlights of multiple programs, or to otherwise identify and view the most interesting content that is available.
At present, it can be a substantial challenge to identify the most interesting content that is available. If multiple sports broadcasts are occurring simultaneously, for example, it can be relatively difficult to know which broadcast is most interesting at any given time without continually switching between the different broadcasts. Similar issues can arise while viewing movies, reality programs, television dramas, action shows or any other programs of interest to any number of different viewers.